I made probably the ugliest lamp stand ever designed on Autodesk Fusion 360. This experience, however, was quite enlightening in the sense that I realized how much effort goes into designing the seemingly most trivial of objects. Since I was not able to attend the second workshop, I turned to YouTube tutorials to guide my way through the program. Luckily they were incredibly easy to follow along. I first designed a lampshade, one of the more popular tutorials from the Autodesk channel. This was relatively simple to follow and manipulate.  

Secondly, I designed a lamp stand that required more of a steady hand and sense of artistic design. I still didn’t achieve an aesthetically pleasing lamp stand, but I eventually picked up the tools better than I initially had. This definitely made me appreciate computer design even more, and that I should invest in a mouse. Even though the program itself takes practice in terms of learning all the tools and options, after getting over that initial hump I learned that the overall purpose of the program is incredibly useful.

3D printing is considered to be the next “Industrial Revolution”. When the concept was first popularized, the general public did not really have access to it. Luckily we go to a university with access to many printers so I can have a firsthand experience to something so revolutionary. When I was following the tutorial of designing the lampshade, I really enjoyed the mathematical art design of the end product. Ultimately, replicating shapes and figures can result in artwork, which is what a program like Autodesk Fusion 360 can allow a user to achieve.

3D printing is so applicable to all fields, and as a chemical engineering student I sometimes worry how much technology can really be applied in this field. Depending on what field I would like to delve into, 3D printing serves a distinct purpose. Of course there is the medicine route, but after doing some more research on Autodesk Fusion 360, I found that they have recently updated their system to include a “Thermal Study and Stress” feature. This provides insight to the user to see thermal effects, namely thermally induced stress, on the design. I found this to be such a cool feature and that this is perfect for designing a chemical reactor at a plant, especially in a safe and controlled environment: a virtual space!